Life According to Sakura
by xX.SwampPrincess.Xx
Summary: "So it's not an easy life. But I manage." Life according to Sakura is no easy task, so will she let the right people into her life? Or will all the wrong people just bring her down?


**Author's Note: **Hello! My name's Delilah Jane, the Swamp Princess. I used to write stories a long, long time ago, like we're talking six years ago. But they were awful. Oh, good Lord, they were so bad haha. I decided to start writing again. I haven't watched or read a Naruto episode or manga in an incredibly long time, so most of my characters will be OOC. Sorry if that bugs you, I don't really care, it's my story. Feel free to review or favorite this story. Flames are appreciated because your words don't really hurt me. Enjoy.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own any of the characters used in this story.

Rated T for strong language and themes.

**Life According to Sakura**

**Chapter 1**

_Don't you see? Don't you see you're killing me? You are physically crumbling me. I'm pleading with you, and my words don't seem to be getting me anywhere. _We _aren't getting anywhere._

But the words, they never left my lips. I just laid there, face blank, holding in the tears. Because I'm strong. That's what he told me. I was taught to "be strong" ever since I was thirteen years old. So whenever my dad would go on a rampage, whenever he got his fix, I would become his personal punching bag. I took the beating, every time. So did my mother. When my mother died, nobody questioned the bruising she had; they thought she just did it to herself. But why would a 43 year old woman kill herself when she had a beautiful child at home? Because the man she loved and married would beat her ass every damn day when he got home. And once my mother was curled into a ball on the floor, I was the next victim.

I guess you could say my dad was better now. He didn't shoot up nearly as often as he did before. Nowadays, since mom was gone, he would use once a week, sometimes twice. He had such a violent reaction to himself and the people around him. He broke his own foot one time, kicking the wall in a fit of rage. There's a bookcase covering that part of the wall now.

"Get up, Sakura," he said to me after his high went away. He dropped to his knees and wrapped himself around me, sobbing. "Look what I've done to you, look what I've done to my baby." I wouldn't say anything to this, I would just hold in my cries and count the seconds till he would let me go and go back to his room. The average I normally got was 362 seconds.

At 18 years old, I lived by myself with my father. Our house was a Victorian era four bedroom, three bathroom, two floor home with a farmer's porch that wrapped all the way around. My bedroom was upstairs, which directly connected to my own bathroom. It was the master suite, my mother wrote in her suicide note that she wanted it to become mine, so my father agreed and moved himself downstairs.

I picked myself up off the floor and walked quietly into my bathroom, locking the door behind myself. I stripped of my clothes and looked at myself in the mirror. Old bruises and new bruises battled each other for my attention, and my reflection left me at a loss of words. Something my dad was good at was avoiding my face. Any damage done to my body was easily covered up with clothes. I stepped into a hot shower and let the steam surround me and wash away what had just happened to me.

After getting out of the shower and getting dressed, I grabbed my stash box from under my bed, closed my bedroom door and opened my window. Out of my closet I grabbed a towel and stuffed it under the door. I know by now my father had exhausted himself to the point of a nap, but I could never be too cautious. Some of my friends looked down on me for what I would do, but they don't know. When I sat on my bed and packed a bowl, I started to calm myself. After that first hit, when the weed smoke hit my lungs, my head cleared. Once I was good and high, I packed another bowl. I might be crazy, but it helps me escape. With each hit, I watched the smoke come out of my lungs and imagined it was all my pain, all my worries.

I started smoking when I was 15 years old. I knew what it was for years, and when I found some in my parents' bedroom, I stole it.

It's magical, really, the way a plant when smoked can make me forget the living hell that I'm in. The skunkish scent became a comfort to me. I packed up my smoking stash and slid it back under my bed. The clock read six o'clock. I settled in for a nap.

**The Next Morning**

"Sakura! You're gonna be late for school," my dad called up the stairs. I grumbled and looked at the clock on my nightstand. It read "6:08," I had slept for 12 hours straight. Jumping out of bed, I rushed to get dressed and ready. 6:35 rolled around and I was all set for school. I stepped into the kitchen and grabbed a glaze donut from the cabinet and went out to my car.

Now I don't have some fantastic car and I'm not rich. But my car isn't a shit hole either. I have a 2002 Toyota Corolla with a new bumper than it originally had. It's a little messy on the inside with some sweater and shoes thrown about in the back. Under the radio there's a small compartment where I keep another stash. I pull the sleeves down on my Konoha High winterguard team sweatshirt, remembering what's underneath and feeling shame.

I drive to a nearby cliff. It is my spot, with a willow tree at the top and a Sakura tree a few feet from that one. I take my pipe and my weed out of my car and sit under the willow. It's 6:47 by this time, same time as always. It's become a ritual for me. Get high, go to school, forget about my troubles. After each hit I feel more and more solitude.

I get to school by 7:15 with a dumb looking smile on my face. Walking into homeroom, I sit in the far right corner of the front row, avoiding eye contact with everyone. I have friends, but not many. I try to stay to myself, letting people in means letting people know. Whenever people find out about my problems they try to tell someone, have the police called or whatever. But it's no one's business but my own.

I open up my math book and do some homework I neglected to finish the night before. The numbers and symbols didn't start dancing and singing like you'd think. I was high, fairly high, yeah. But I focused better then. I whipped through my math problems with enough time to spare.

Classes flew by and before I knew it, it was lunch at 11:35. It was typical for me to sit with my friends Hinata and Tenten. I grabbed my normal choice of lunch, a tuna sandwich on a roll with extra pickles, salt and pepper, and sat at the normal table with the normal people, yknow, all that normal shit.

"I know your secret," he whispered into my ear. It tickled my neck and made me gasp and jump all at once, throwing the chip I was about to eat at Tenten who was next to me. I gave her an apologetic look and looked at my accuser. "What are you talking about?" I asked him.

"I know you get high before you come to school. It's so obvious. You don't look anyone in the eye and you shake your leg and you have that dopey looking expression on your face. C'mon Sakura, you know it's true."

I looked Sasuke right in the eye and whispered angrily, "Fuck off."

I heard laughter come from a nearby lunch table, Naruto and the whole gang. "Look," I growled, "go tell your stupid little twit friends that what I do is none of their business," I started to get up, my voice now loud enough for them to hear. "And they can fucking eat me out if they think I give a damn what they think." I rolled up my sleeves too quickly to realize what I had done. I saw the shock in his eyes as he studied my arms, and I quickly turned around and pushed my sleeves back down before he could say anything. Lucky for me, the lunch bell then rang, and I grabbed my backpack and walked as fast as I could manage to English class.

Once I got settled in class all I could think about was what I had just done. It was an open invitation for Sasuke to ask all about what happens behind closed doors at my home. Sure, they figured out that I smoke weed before school, but I don't really care about that. I'm more worried about having my father arrested and not knowing what I'm gonna do with myself. I mean, I'm eighteen, it's not like they can ship me off to a foster home or something. It's only March, there's still months before I can go away to live at a dorm for college. And I don't have any relatives who live close by to take me.

It's times like these where I wish my mother hadn't killed herself. She always gave such great advice growing up, my guiding light.

"Sakura?" I looked up from my desk and saw Hinata looking at me. "Are you alright?" Hinata knows my secret, as does Tenten. It's hard for me to let people into my life, but when I told Hinata about my dad and my mom, she broke down into tears for me. I don't like to have people feel bad for me; it makes me feel ashamed that I put up with all the bullshit. But Hinata had a way of accepting all the things that were wrong in the world and making you believe that they were okay, that you'd be okay.

I looked away from her and my cheeks burned. I wasn't so much embarrassed as I was angry. I never got along with Sasuke, or Naruto, or most people who I go to school with. It was just common knowledge that I kind of stuck to myself. Not in a loser, weirdo Goth kid who eats alone in the library kind of way, but I just had a small group of friends. I wore jeans and a sweatshirt, everyday. Different sweatshirts and jeans all the time, but generally I would wear just about that. I know why they tease me, I can see it in all their eyes…

I have these intense, hard-to-miss green eyes with sort of blue gray flecks in them. My eyes shine really bright, so even when I'm stoned or when I'm avoiding eye contact with you, they're captivating. And my mother cursed with my incredibly straight, bright pink hair that I've tried to dye before but won't retain color. I've considered bleaching my hair before, but it's too much of a miss-priss thing for me to do. Plus, it will attract more attention to me than I actually want.

Class flew by without another exchange between me and Hinata, as did the rest of the day. I didn't bother to stop back at my locker at the end of the day, I just walked to my car and drove to my willow tree before anyone could confront me.

So it's not an easy life. But I manage.

**Author's Note: **So there's my first chapter. Decent if you ask me. Hopefully you guys will like it so I can put up another chapter. Please feel free to review. (:

xx Delilah Jane


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